Posted by RichSlick under UncategorizedComments Off on Financial Lessons Learned – It’s Worth It To Pay To Avoid Commercials

Yesterday I wrote about the abysmal state of retail affairs and I wrote mostly about my personal experience but I also wanted to cover another topic on why I think retail is suffering. A few years ago, I cut the cord and switched most of my TV viewing habits primarily to three mediums: Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime. I frequently alternate between HBO and Showtime when new seasons of my favorite shows start so that’s technically a fourth.

Initially, my wife and kids mostly watched Hulu but begged me to get rid of the commercials so I paid the extra money to avoid commercials. It didn’t occur to me then but it did hit me recently with this thought. As my kids began watching commercial free TV, they also demanded less and less products. Over the last three years, I can’t think of a single thing that my kids have asked for me to buy them aside from Apple products. Long gone are the days where they watch a TV commercial and say, “I want one of those.”

It’s not just my kids though, I too haven’t seen too many commercials either. And I not only avoid commercials on TV, I also have numerous ad-blockers on my computers and electronic devices that I rarely see an ad. I mostly listen to Spotify now and it is also commercial free – no more radio ads for me. I recently got a new computer at work and it did not come pre-loaded with ad-blockers and I was shocked to see so many ads on web pages! I was even tempted to buy some items that were deeply discounted but they disappeared as soon as I loaded the ad-blockers!

Yesterday, I wrote about the retail “ecosystem” and it occurred to me that the “ecosystem” also includes advertisements but in this case ads are an inverse reaction to successful retail. Combine the horrible retail experience with ad-blocking TV, Music, Internet and it’s not too hard to figure out why retail is suffering tremendously.